


Guild Business

by Aubry



Category: Jam and Jerusalem
Genre: Coming Out, F/F, Female Friendship, Femslash, Older Characters, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-11-25
Updated: 2012-11-25
Packaged: 2017-11-19 13:46:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/573918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aubry/pseuds/Aubry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A camping trip changes Susie and Caroline's relationship for good. Susie is torn between delirium and terror until the inevitable interference of the guild brings matters to a head. Caroline just wants everyone to stop using the wrong words.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Guild Business

**Author's Note:**

> There's so little J&J fic out there that I thought I'd give it a shot. It isn't Shakespeare, but I hope that perhaps it will hit the spot for somebody who loves Susie and Caroline as much as I do.

“No – the peg thingy goes in first and _then_ you swing that bit round-”

 

“Oh for heaven's sake, woman. Are you tying a knot or are you trying to spin yarn into gold?”

 

“Extend the bearing rod – what's the bearing rod? Is this the bearing rod?”

 

“Try hitting it with the hammer again!”

 

“Eileen, is this the bearing rod?”

 

The sun was a low red glimmer on the horizon now, but the buzz of activity in the clearing was no calmer than it had been an hour before. Hooks, ropes, and rods stretched and tangled through the dry grass. Only two tents stood erect, one at either side of the clearing, each propped near the tree-line like the lid of a jigsaw box offering hope that an end might eventually be in sight. The first was the small pop-up one-man tent that Pauline had carried with her. It had popped-up uninvited and trapped its owner between the trees at least four times during the hike, but now it seemed the last laugh was Pauline's. The second tent belonged to Susie and Caroline.

 

They sat on the tarpauline outside the tent's open flap watching the others with a certain detachment.

 

“Should we help them, do you think?” Caroline asked.

 

“Yes, probably,” said Susie.

 

Neither made any move to get up. Susie fiddled absent-mindedly with the lid of her flask. She could help, she knew. Eileen and Kate had made the same mistake with the guide ropes three times now. Really she _ought_ to help. Everyone knew she was terribly handy with things like this. She and Caroline had gotten their tent up with a minimum of fuss, because Susie was clever with her hands and Caroline – well – Caroline was always so refreshingly good about just listening and then doing what Susie asked when it came to practical things.

 

Caroline held out her Tupperware mug without looking around. _We're not bossy about the_ same _things, that's why it works_ , Susie thought as she obediently topped up Caroline's coffee.

 

From this remove the actual words of the other members of the Women's Guild were only intermittently audible. Tip's hooting laughter briefly rose out of the general hubub from where she and Sal now lay in a tangle of limbs and canvas. The scene was lulling, hypnotic; like an open-air play in which one wasn't the least invested. Behind them the woodlands were stirring slightly in the evening breeze as the low light brought out more evening insects. Susie hoped that there was nothing worse than moths and spiders out here, but found even that thought wasn't enough to rouse her from comfortable idleness. Beside her Caroline was equally silent.

 

A harvestman flew by and Susie's gaze followed its path until it disappeared behind Caroline. She let her eyes settle on her friend, who was frowning at something. Whether she was watching the others, or a million miles away puzzling something out Susie didn't know. Still and sombre like this Caroline was inscrutable. Susie loved that. As soon as Caroline spoke she would be sucked into the flow of her friend's thoughts – agreeing, enquiring or correcting – whatever Caroline needed. But for the moment, it was exciting not to know where Caroline's mind was wandering.

 

Private throughts were a favourite topic of Susie's to muse over. Wondering and guessing how different other people were inside themselves than on the outside was exhillirating. True, with Caroline she suspected that a lot of the time what you saw was what you got. But perhaps not always.

 

The low sun brought out glints of burnished gold in Caroline's hair.

 

 _I want to kiss you,_ Susie thought. _I want to touch you._ And this was Susie's secret thrill. She shouted the words loud in her own head and marvelled to think that while they deafened her, Caroline couldn't hear them at all. _I want to pin you to the ground beneath me, right here in front of everybody we know._ Caroline looked over then and gave her a lazy smile.

 

“Shall we take it in turns to get changed and then turn in?” she asked.

 

“Yes, alright,” Susie agreed. “You go first.”

 

\--

 

Outside the tent the noise had finally petered out until Rosie's last loud good-nights had been shut down with a cringe-inducing “Goodnight, John Boy” from Eileen and a far less jolly order from Tip to “Shut up, the feckin' pair of you before I kill you”. Now the night was perfectly still.

 

Despite this, Susie could not sleep. The restful mood of an hour ago had entirely dissipated for her. She lay in the dark biting her lip and desperately willing her racing thoughts to slow. Why did she never learn? Why couldn't she just stop? She brought this on herself entirely. There were thoughts you just didn't think, and thinking you were cleverer than other people for thinking them in secret just got you in a muddle.

 

Beside her, far too close and a million miles away, Caroline was already dead to the world. She was a sprawler, it turned out. Her sleeping bag was rucked down to her waist where her long legs had drawn it as she'd kicked about to get comfortable. Her arms were thrown above her head. The neck of her pyjama shirt gaped open across her collarbone, evidently meant for somebody with a much broader chest and therefore tantalisingly loose on Caroline. Her husband's shirt, Susie was forced to conclude. Had she brought it in case it was cold? Or in case she missed John? Or did she not have pyjamas of her own to bring? Did she not usually...

 

Susie ground the heels of her hands into her eye-sockets until her vision filled with coloured sparks. She felt choked with claustrophobia. Perhaps she should get up and leave the tent. Go for a walk. But where would she go? That was the problem, wasn't it? Wherever she went she would never get away from herself.

 

With a huff of annoyance at herself, at Caroline and at the world she rolled onto her side, her quick, short breaths bouncing back at her from against the wall of the tent. Susie shut out the world and tested herself to see what she could remember of her schedule for the coming month.

 

 _Start of year parent-teacher meeting on the fourth. Bring and Buy for the scouts on the sixth. Ballet class starts back on the seventh. Football doesn't begin again until the following week, but parent meeting on the_ evening _of the seventh to introduce the new coaches. Trip to town before the tenth to buy new trainers for them both, but_ after _the eighth because the photographs won't be ready for collection before then._

 

Behind her Caroline sighed softly in her sleep.

 

_Start of year parent-teacher meeting on the fourth..._


End file.
